Great all around playing on another great day at Ventura with the Grateful Dead. My favorite place to see them. They are definitely "on" this day as they were the whole weekend. I feel blessed to have seen them there.

I did ALL the shows at the Fair Grounds and several others ..buit the Dead at the Beach was sooo cool

Listen to DRUMS at 09:13. I won't spoil it here. When I heard this at the show, I remember looking to the people near me and wondering "did that just happen?" Never heard them do that in over 60 shows.

Overall, a really fun weekend, I was sorry to lose that venue.

I was at this show! It is a great venue to experience a dead show. Camped on the beach -- so beautiful - made some friends that night that later became like brothers. It was the beginning of one of the most magical periods of my life actually. Anyway, I just listened to the stream - first time I have heard the show since that night and it is quite good. Nice clear sound, good energy, tight performance. I highly recommend.

though I had heard about the Dead while in prep school in 1985, I didn't get to see them live till this show and it was very eye opening for me. I loved the venue being so close to the ocean. The backdrop was nice and maybe it was just the stick of incense that smelled so good, but this was just an amazing day for me. I have been able to get some of this tape but not the Quinn the Eskimo. So it's nice to finally get to hear that again. My tam is off to the folks at the website that allowed this to be open for listening, I give thanks. I also send respects to all the other people that were there that day, but most of my thanks is to the band, thanks for a great show

1980's Grateful Dead at its finest.

Yeah Dead at the Beach...can it be beat? Rocking festive show with that classic laid back west coast feel...camping scene classic (sorry Ventura...did you really need to ban the boys?) Lost my friends in the crowd, but found my way back via the smoke signals they were sending (from a 2ft long joint they'd rolled out of a plant we'd nurtured all year long at UCSB). Sound in the aud was a little "windy" with that typical afternoon seabreeze blowing everything around, but a good show (not as good as some earlier Spring 87 I'd say, however).

What would happen if we were offered the opportunity to actually (as opposed to virtually) go back in time to this show? Would the two-star raters balk? I think not. Two-stars, five-stars, no-stars, the chance to be with the Dead again would never be passed up...not knowing what we know now. Any year, any lineup, any show...I'd be there.

1st Set: During a mildly rocking "Hell" a MIDI-fest erupts... or some typs of odd distortion. A standard "Sugaree" follows til a killer eye-rolling solo @ 6:30. In honor of the bellowed request, a warm "Tons" follows. A train can 'ramble', why not a 'rose?' Standard, but professional. The same could be said of the plaful "Uncle" & "Mexicali." But there's something missing here... it's all fine, but the fast songs lack mean bilious Bite. "Althea" is a perfect pace/choice. There are plenty of opportunities for each member to take in the space and fill it without worrying about making it rock. "Stranger" cymbally slides around...there's plenty of interesting noises to smile consider. Hmmmph, our first "Might as Well" in a while; it's enjoyably sloshy, but lacks the blithe Ease that epitomizes the finest. Jerry tries though with his sapped up voice, and his instrument is by far the strongest, if sloppiest of the bunch.

2nd Set: Hi, we're the 'Begonias' you're singing about, we need more youthful energy if we're going to blossom. Wow, even "Fire" is truly boring me. It's all pleasant and well-played but lacks absolutely No danger. "Playin" contains some moments of inspired intricateness and is well-played but continues my overall disinterest. "Terrapin" follows suit... you know, I'm not complaining-they're choosing meaty songs, and I don't mean to sound ungrateful for their existance... but these versions alienate because they're fine but never vibrantly alive. "Drums," "Space," are fine, tho 'Space' is more alluring than '87 norm. "Truckin" at least has a mild modicum of smoke billowing from its windpipe. "Wharf," "Throwing" "NFA" are all polite, professional and absolutely inessential. Bobby gets in a few virile yelps during "NFA" but to little avail. I've checked out of this one.

"Quinn" continues the banality, tho to be there I'm sure is a better live experience than listening to it on tape. But at least with shows that are bombs, the true horror of your ears listening to that mess compels one to continue.

It was at Ventura, June 14th, 1987. Just a gorgeous, perfect, sunny day. The venue, the Fairgrounds, is a rodeo. The grounds consist of a floor that is dirt, (with huge dirt clods) encircled by wooden fences with advertisements, and the stage is set up at one end of the circle, with the entrance at the back end. Bleachers off to the beach side. And it is right next to the beach. I mean the water is right there next to it. The air is so fresh!
I was about 80 feet from the stage, and there was a break in the music. So people started to chill out and the noise got real quite. Most people were just silent and content. And I thought how much I would love to hear them do "Tons of Steel". Not just because of how much I love the song, but because it was rather rare to me -- I hadn't heard it many times and the album wasn't out yet. So when it was all quite, I yelled at the top of my lungs "Nine -- Hundred --- Thousand -- Tons -- of -- Steel." I elongated each word so it took me about 15 seconds to scream out the whole song title. I was so loud that every one around me just stared and looked like "what the fuck!"
So then, I did see Jerry go over and talk to Brent for about a minute. They came back and took their spots and didled around another minute, then just broke into 900, 000 tons of steel. So I don't know if it was a coincident or not. But then people were staring at me like "Jesus Christ, how did you do that?"

That was though, the one and only time I ever shouted out a song title at my 80+ Grateful Dead concerts.

This is a great show, I was there and the fire on the mountain in the second set was because of huge fires in the mountains that day inland. The steal your face flag was dancing in the breeze....my first and unfortunatly my last west coast show...:-( GREAT SOUND

But the music is magic, dig the very latin beat on Fire on the Mountain....enjoy.....Bu Bye

Daysbtween